The Trail of Tears

Thousands of Native Americans passed through many parts of Arkansas on their way to Indian Territory. Some walked or rode horses across the land. Others came up the Arkansas River by way of Fort Smith. There are 5 state parks in Arkansas that mark a portion of the Trail of Tears. What could have caused these Indians to leave their homelands?

Read page 100-103 and the passage to the right. Click the link below to answer.

In 1838, the United States government forcibly removed more than 16,000 Cherokee Indian people from their homelands in Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina, and Georgia, and sent them to Indian Territory (today known as Oklahoma).

The impact to the Cherokee was devastating. Hundreds of Cherokee died during their trip west, and thousands more perished from the consequences of relocation. This tragic chapter in American and Cherokee history became known as the Trail of Tears, and culminated the implementation of the Indian Removal Act of 1830, which mandated the removal of all American Indian tribes east of the Mississippi River to lands in the West. Thirty-one forts were built for this purpose on the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail. The Trail runs through Arkansas and had many stopping points in the state.